By Jeremy Thompson

Some might argue (i.e., myself) that after the development of motion pictures just before the turn of the century cinema evolved from the quaint diversion into a sophisticated art form, climaxing by the beginning of the 1940’s before running out of new directions for the next couple decades. But similar to how Einstein’s theory of relativity reinvigorated a tiring scientific community, the same happened in Europe around the 1960’s. American cinema soon caught on and merged the European style with our own brand of narrative, the art form peaking again in the 1970’s before plunging back into the turgid waters of 80’s studio films; the 1990’s dominated by ironic pastiche but at least with a growing independently-produced voice giving power back to the directors. If so, it might be possible that the 2000’s represented the third summit of cinema, one in which digital technology allowed for expanded means of storytelling while at the same time allowing maverick directors to find an audience they otherwise couldn’t have tapped without the advent of DVDs and the internet. If the batch of films below is any indication that very well could be true, although I certainly hope that doesn’t mean we need to descend the slope once more in the coming decade.

P.S. I realize I did cheat a bit on my promise of 21 films; in actuality there are more like 30. Also don’t take this list too literally, for one I’ve still not seen a good number of quality movies from the last ten years, and attempting to rank them in a specific order is more of a writing device than a literal indication on each’s quality relative to the others. Hopefully there will be some titles on here you haven’t heard of (or have but didn’t know if they were worth the time or not) that catch your interest and inspire a trip to the rental store or the Netflix queue to try something new.

The list…

1. Synecdoche, New York (2008) – “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players…” This phrase has been quoted and requoted ad nauseam for centuries, but I suspect Charlie Kaufman is one of the few people that truly understood what Shakespeare was implying when he wrote that… (read more)

2. There Will Be Blood (2007) – The traditional western persona is characterized by independence and self-reliance, a disinterest in social relationships with an introspective silence almost born of an Eastern Zen master, albeit one without as steadfast of a moral compass… (read more)

3. Mulholland Dr. (2001) – I didn’t really like David Lynch’s Mulholland Dr. when I first saw it. It’s not that I wasn’t open to something really experimental and non-conventional, I knew going into the film that became hard to follow, but I was careful to pay extra attention to the details so that way I wouldn’t be left scratching my head at the end… which is exactly what happened anyway… (read more)

4. Let the Right One In (2008) – Genre is an important tool in storytelling, but many filmmakers working today misuse or abuse genre, and as a result we have cineplexes stuffed full of genre movies that are, for lack of a better word, generic… (read more)

5. Kill Bill vol. 1 & 2 (2003 & 04) / Grindhouse (2007) / Inglourious Basterds (2009) – Quentin Tarantino might seem to be an easy director to dismiss, seemingly unable to overcome perpetual juvenilism, his movies are each an exercise extravagant cinematic fanboy pastiche. But honestly, in a weird way each of the titles mentioned above are kind of, sort of, just a little bit masterpieces… (read more)

6. Zodiac (2007) – “There’s more than one way to lose your life to a killer.” Thus read the tagline for David Fincher’s murder mystery based on the real life Zodiac murderer that haunted the San Francisco bay area during the late sixties and early seventies, and it’s a surprisingly perceptive insight into the movie’s deeper significance… (read more)

7. Gerry (2002) / Elephant (2003) / Last Days (2005) – Two twenty-somethings both named Gerry go for a short hike in the desert to see what is only obliquely referred to as “the thing”. They lose interest and decide to amble on back to the car while enjoying the desert scenery. They get lost. They walk around in different directions for several days. They do not find the road. They only become more lost… (read more)

8. Caché (2005) / Funny Games (2008) / (?) The White Ribbon (2009) – At one point Austrian director Michael Haneke must have realized that the important relationships in a movie aren’t those that happen between the characters on the screen, but between the audience and the screen itself… (read more)

9. Children of Men (2006) – The cinematography by Emmanuel Lubezki is amazing. Not only for the fact that they were able to film an entire car chase sequence in a single shot, but that it was still completely organic within the context of the film that it took me no less than three viewings before I realized, “hey, this whole scene is one continuous shot!” (read more)

10. The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters (2007) – Many fictional movies these days can have difficulty creating a narrative imperative with sympathetic characters in which a genuine sense of pathos is felt when the good guy looses and the bad guy wins, as well as crafting a sense of place and time in a world different from our own and yet one we can still strongly relate to… (read more)

11. No Country for Old Men (2007) – When I first saw it I was convinced I was watching one of the most important cinematic achievements within the past decade. The ending in particular had audiences gasping in disbelief… (read more)

12. The Dark Knight (2008) – At long last, a box-office success that managed to thrill both casual movie-goers and fans of the franchise along with many seasoned cineastes alike. I was beginning to think there was a complete inverse correlation between the quality of a film and its domestic gross… (read more)

13. Shaun of the Dead (2004) – There was a time, long ago and far away, when the zombie movie as created by George A Romero was just as much about social commentary as it was about zombies… (read more)

14. Donnie Darko (2001) – First-time director Richard Kelly wisely chose to set his debut feature film in the 1980’s, giving it immediacy with the teen movies (especially those by John Hughes) that dominated the era… (read more)

15. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007) – A trademark of good filmmaking is the ability to transport you to a time and place, to get lost within the world the characters inhabit and respond as if you were right there with them; there’s always a moment of sadness as the film nears the end credits that we have to leave this fictional world and face reality once again… (read more)

16. Adaptation. (2002) – It’s a movie about the making of itself. The audience watches scenes of screenwriter Charlie Kaufman (played by Nicholas Cage) write the very scene we are watching right now, creating an endless hall of mirrors effect of meta-reflexive self analysis… (read more)

17. Superbad (2007) / Adventureland (2009) – The second half of the decade saw cinematic comedy dominated by the name “Apatow”, although if there was one name that actually deserved the praise it would be that of part-time Apatow collaborator Greg Mottola… (read more)

18. Junebug (2005) / The Squid and the Whale (2005) – The year 2005 produced these two stellar independent family dramas, each taking place in opposite ends of the voting bloc (one in the Deep South, the other in Brooklyn, New York) but both examining the friction, humor, anguish and humanity created by familial bonds… (read more)

19. The Departed (2006) – Now this is what movie-going should always be like. Martin Scorsese’s long-delayed Oscar win for directing this remake of the Hong Kong thriller Infernal Affairs was not undeserved for its own merits… (read more)

20. Watchmen (2009) – I was intrigued by Watchmen. I suspect more of that comes from the source material by Alan Moore than by Zach Snyder’s process of adapting that work to celluloid, but at very least the director cannot be faulted for being unfaithful to the graphic novel… (read more)

21. The Incredibles (2004) – Pixar’s stronghold on quality, innovative animation in the past fifteen years was perhaps highlighted by in my opinion, Brad Bird’s The Incredibles. (read more)

Honorable Mentions: Antichrist; Bad Santa; Burn After Reading; City of God; Cloverfield; Coraline; Crimson Gold;  Dogville; Encounters at the End of the World; The Fantastic Mr. Fox; The Girlfriend Experience; Gosford Park; The Host; Hot Fuzz; Humpday; I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead; In Bruges; Iron Man; Juno; Knocked Up; Little Miss Sunshine; The Lives of Others; Man on Wire; The Man Who Wasn’t There; Mary & Max; Match Point; Memento; Men at Work; Michael Clayton; The New World; O Brother, Where Art Thou?; Oldboy; Once; Paprika; The Proposition; Punch-Drunk Love; Street Thief; Thirst; The Triplets of Belleville; United 93; Where the Wild Things Are.

Notice: This list is obviously pretty lacking and not even I would be willing to call it anywhere near an actual best of list. For a much more professional decade retrospective I recommend looking at Slant Magazine’s article which covers 100 different films.